Evolution of Roman Armour - Kingdom, Republic, Empire

This video is brought to you by Squarespace, the all-in-one platform for your online store, marketing tools to develop your own website, and much more. Hey noble ones, welcome back to my channel, this is The Metatron speaking, and today we're talking about the evolution of Roman armour through the centuries, and one of the things we're trying to understand is what Roman legionaries looked like as Rome progressively improved their ability to make war. Well, there are a lot of things to say and a lot of things to show you, I've got everything laid out here, so let's get started. Well, first of all, the kind of impression that I have built here, this is the most typical, stereotypical Roman soldier when it comes to the media, whether it be video games or movies. However, what's important to say is that this isn't the most typical kind of Roman soldier, believe it or not, when it comes to historical analysis. The helmet I'm wearing right now is called an Imperial Gallic Type H, and the kind of armour I'm wearing is a Lurica Segmentata. Please keep in mind that these terms are not period, we have no idea what the Romans called these. This specific kind of armour wasn't used for about three centuries, but Roman history is a lot longer than that. We know that Rome was founded, traditionally, in the 8th century BC, and this is when we start with a very kind of tribal warfare. Basically, we don't have professional soldiers at the time, we've just got men that are sent to fight wars, to defend their land, providing their own equipment. What that means is that these kind of militias weren't uniformly equipped, and it all had to do with how much wealth you had. So, the majority of these soldiers wouldn't have had any armour at all, but those who could afford it would have been wearing helmets and some sort of armour. Although it's very difficult to pinpoint or understand exactly what this kind of armour looked like and how it was made, as we don't have much information on this period. Most likely, one of the earliest types of armour worn by these kind of soldiers was the cardiophylax. We can base this on both literature and the findings from the Esquiline Necropolis, in Italian, Necropoli dell'Esquilino. So, what were these heart protectors? Well, we know that we're talking about some sort of plate of bronze, relatively small, that was used as a chest protector to protect your heart. Some people kind of get confused on where the heart is in the chest. The heart is in the centre, tilting to the left, but it's not completely to the left, as some people think. Now, when it comes to the cardiophylax, it's important to understand that the first examples are somewhat rectangular and rhomboid, and many different shapes coexist. So, it's not easy to say this one came after this other one. But, in the 2nd century, we have a mention that most likely points towards the circular ones as being a later version. And this mention comes from Polybius. He reads, "...the common soldiers wear in addition a breastplate of brass, a span square, which they place in front of the heart and call the heart protector, this completing their accounterments. But those who are rated above 10,000 drachmas wear instead of this a coat of mail." Well, whenever we see them represented in either reenactment or art, they are represented as a square of plate. But is this a correct representation? My opinion is no. They probably looked differently. Now, at first glance, you might think, Metatron, are you out of your mind? It clearly says it's a square. But that's because we're reading it in English. When we read it in Greek, it looks very different. And I'd like to underline that what I'm about to say is backed by two experts, Gioia Alcanestrelli from Europa Antiqua channel, and Luke Ranieri from Polymathy and ScorpioMartianus channel. It doesn't say span square. It says this big all around. Now, pair this new piece of information with this specific archaeological finding from Spain, and then I think we'll understand that most likely these cardiophylax were round. You can also notice that this one specifically has a lot of different small holes all around, and that is because although very early cardiophylax in all of their shapes, because there were several, were probably worn just over a tunic, as time passes, it is possible that they were either worn over some form of subarmalis, kind of a padded jacket, or that they had an actual padding riveted directly onto them, a sort of liner, which would explain all the holes around it. Now, what were these chest protectors made of? Well, the traditional answer would be copper alloy. I'll refer you to my video up here. Modern bronze, just like this replica of a Montefortino helmet, is copper plus tin. In other words, these two, copper and tin. We are very specific and pragmatic in our modern era, but in ancient times, whenever we read bronze, it's not always copper and tin. We've got lots of other options. Sometimes they also added zinc, which means that technically it's a brass, from a modern perspective, like in this case. But other times, neither tin nor zinc was added into the mix, and you have something in the lines of arsenic bronze. And other times, historical bronze is just copper plus a lot of other stuff. So yes, something like this, not really sure. One of the difficulties in creating an evolutionary tree for Roman armour, particularly this period, is the fact that a lot of these sets of armour co-existed. The round version co-existed with both the pseudo muscolata and the full muscolata armour, but the circular cardiophyllax kept on being used. So please don't misunderstand this as linear. Once this armour is developed, the previous armour disappear, because that's not how it happened. Male, or lorica hamata, is where the situation becomes really interesting, although I'd like to point out this is medieval, so yeah. Male was adopted by the Romans towards the last quarter of the 3rd century, and most likely they copied it from the Celts. There are three things I'd like to point out that people usually misunderstand about male, as far as I understand them. First, the name lorica hamata is not period, just like lorica segmentata is not period. It is possible that the Romans instead called it gallica, which is interesting because it kind of points out again to its Celtic origins. Another thing that I notice a lot of reenactors mention is the fact that male needs to be riveted, or at least half riveted, half solid ring. So when I say riveted, I mean that a ring is closed into its final form by the addition of a separate rivet. Now it's important to underline that that can be misleading, because it really depends what sort of impression you're building. Anything from the half of the 2nd century, then I agree with you. That's when riveted male starts to be used. It is a sort of technological development. But for anything that comes before that, then male would have been butted. That's what the historical evidence shows. And here is a list of all the sorts of male shirts that are period. Have a look. Last but not least, the closing mechanism and the function of the umeralia, so these bits here. In later versions of hamata, these umeralia act as shoulder reinforcements and possibly also as a very stylish way to wear armor, because they make your armor look a lot like the sort of linothorax or spolas that we are going to talk about in a little bit. But they do give you extra protection on the shoulders, which makes sense, and it's something that we see happening also in later versions of armor, like the lorica segmentata here. But when we look at early examples of lorica hamata, then they are not reinforcements at all. They are the closing mechanism, which is called tube and yoke. So in other words, in very early examples of hamata, the shoulders were used to connect it. So one would be permanently attached and the other one would be open. You would get into the armor and then you would secure it, but you would have nothing underneath it. You wouldn't have extra male. And that is exactly what it looks like or what iconography suggests. And now I'd like to take a moment to mention the sponsor that made this video possible, Squarespace. With Squarespace, creating your own website, blog, online store and the like is very easy. As you blog on Squarespace, you can use their share button, which is connected to all the major social media platform to help you create an online name. And it's fully configurable. The platform also allows you to gather monetary contributions for your cause, and these can be sent as donations through PayPal, Apple Pay, Stripe, Venmo, as to be easily accessible for all people. I really like the fact that Squarespace has this built-in email campaign system that lets you engage with your audience as you share your products or blogs with them. And you can also attach your logo to strengthen your brand name. What's incredible about this platform is that it also allows you to create members-only content and of course, manage and communicate with each single one of your members in order to create ad hoc content, specifically designed for your members and supporters. So, what are you waiting for? Head to squarespace.com and get your free trial today. Once you're done with your free trial, go to squarespace.com slash Metatron and use the code METATRON to get a 10% off your first website or domain purchase. Big thanks to Squarespace for sponsoring my video. What about musculata armor? The masochurus, the one that looks anatomically shaped to the torso of a warrior. Well, that kind of armor originates in Greece and it was made of bronze. Now, what's interesting is that the Romans copied the Etruscans who copied the Greeks. As they were trying to expand, the Romans had several wars with other Italic populations such as the Etruscans. The Etruscans fought in the manner of the Greek, just like the Gauls fought in the manner of the Greek. Long spears and round shields, compact formation. The Romans were excellent at copying what their adversaries were doing. As we explore the iconography, we sometimes see musculata armor being relatively long covering the full torso and other times it looks very short, more like a breastplate if you will, even though it still retains the anatomical representation, now of course smaller, of a muscular torso. The one that looks more like a full body is the expensive one, the one that looked more like the original Greek version and it's normally associated to either emperors, generals and very successful officers. The shorter one, however, it was definitely less expensive to make. But another thing is the fact that even though the Romans tried to copy and mimic the Greek style of warfare, it was always more dynamic and more mobile and so in order to gain extra mobility, they opted for shorter versions of the musculata and coexisting at the same time, we also have the so-called pseudo-musculata armors. These we could say are an in-between evolutionary step between the cardiothorax and the short musculata type. Now if you look at this picture, you'll have to excuse the way they were reconstructed because those are not shoulders, those are the connectors to the sides. So it would be made of a small back plate, a chest plate and two side plates. As we start to talk about the loricas guamata, so the scale armor, the situation becomes complicated. We don't have one single full lorica squamata, unfortunately, to look at in the archaeological evidence, but we do have a lot of scattered or single scales and we also have a lot of representations of squamata. The origins are unsure, but we do know that it was used for a very long time. It is generally accepted that it was made of small metal scales sewn to a fabric backing or sometimes it wasn't attached to a backing and it was instead connected with metal wire. Iron or bronze scales were used that were one to five centimeters broad. When it comes to literary evidence, Plutarch mentions the lorica squamata as the sort of armor used by the Roman soldier Locullus. Squamata or scale armor was used by both the Romans and the Etruscans and there is a difference. When we look at the Etruscan statues or bronze figurines, we see that in the majority of cases, they maintain the humeralias, the shoulder flaps. But when it comes into the Roman world, then we see a difference. No humeralia in the majority of cases or very small ones. So when it comes to the Roman version, it is more probable that it looked more like a shirt you would wear. In the Etruscan world, it was again a tube and yoke closing system. If we are to believe the iconography, lorica squamata is worn by the insignifer and aquilifer, by auxilia and also by common legionaries. If we look at the Trajan column, we will get the impression that all citizen legionaries wear segmentata, but that's just an idealized representation. It's the ideal legionary. But check this representation here, which was actually carved by the legionaries themselves. See how instead we see a much more realistic representations of soldier wearing anything they could. As you are fighting in the far eastern borders of the empire, soldiers come across lots of different kinds of equipment. They wear the manica because they need it. And if a soldier finds a squamata or scale armor and they like it, they will buy it or they will loot it from their opponents and wear it. Initially in the republican period when it appears, it probably was luxury. It was expensive and only some successful and wealthy soldiers could afford it. But as we go towards later part of the principate and the dominant in eastern provinces, then it was easier to come across, becomes more common. We know that the version used by the romans, at least the later version, overlapped in all directions. The majority of scales found have holes all around. Early squamata would only overlap from top to bottom. When it comes to the linothorax, generally speaking, people think of the Greeks. But it's interesting to say that there is evidence that also romans used the linothorax. Now we don't know if it was the one made of actual linen. Some people speculate that it could have been the version that is sometimes called spolas, that is instead made of leather. There is still a lot of debate on which one is the most historical one. And when it comes to the linen one, even if we accept it to be the one linothorax used by the romans, we don't know how the 10 or 12 layers of linen were put together, glued or intertwined. But whichever it is, it was used again by high-end officers, sometimes by generals, and interestingly enough, by emperor Galba. Or at least that's what the sources say. That shouldn't really surprise us because we know the roman emperors owned armour and most likely they owned quite a few different sets. When it comes to the lorica segmentata, there were several prototypes and several different types. I do have a full video on the lorica segmentata, this one here, although it is in latin. So I'll just summarize for you here. When we first didn't have any surviving example of a full segmentata, we only had fragments and so we used and relied heavily on artistic representations such as the Trajan column. On the Trajan column, the lorica segmentata looks very stylized and it's difficult to understand the closing mechanism or the actual shape of the plates. This is why archaeological discoveries are what really helped us understand how these worked, what they looked like, and how they were. The calcrise version from 9 BC to 43 AD. From 69 to 100 we have the corbridge typologies and from 164 to 180 the Newsted type was in use. There is also another type called Alba Iulia from a badly damaged statue originated in modern-day Romania. All in all, the currently accepted range from the usage of this armor is from 14 BC to the 3rd century AD. Note again the different closing mechanisms for the different typologies. Leather stripe or metal hooks. Upper and lower sections are connected by hooks, just like the corbridge beam. Lamela also existed in the ancient world and in the ancient italic tradition. Look at these incredible statues and bronzes from the Etruscan world. This is Lamela. How did it overlap? How common was it? How was it built? We don't know. Did the Romans use it? It is possible, but unfortunately there isn't enough information about this. Lamela is not only far eastern kind of armor, but it was also italic and it was also used in the Italian peninsula. Unfortunately, Lamela were never found. Did the plumata exist? Plumata usually means scales directly attached to a hamata, so on mail. Something was found in Britannia, but no one knows what they were used for. It is possible it was a more expensive kind of armor, possibly used by some ancient auxiliary. All right, noble ones. Well, I hope that you enjoyed this video. If you did, please remember thumbs up and if you are not yet members of this community, become a noble one. Subscribe to my channel for more content from the Metatron and please don't forget to check out Squarespace that supported and sponsored this video. Thank you very much for watching and remember, the Metatron has spread his wings. Goodbye.